


Skin Thin

by dinglehoppersaplenty



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Exhaustion, M/M, Minor Injuries, Pre-Relationship, Sharing Clothes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-21
Updated: 2013-01-21
Packaged: 2017-11-26 07:32:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/648117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinglehoppersaplenty/pseuds/dinglehoppersaplenty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If you ask him, Stiles will tell you that he made it to Derek’s place of his own volition, thank you very much, if by ‘own volition’ you mean that he put one foot in front of the other, even though he hadn’t put any weight on them and hadn’t even known where they were going.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Skin Thin

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [krakenface](krakenface.tumblr.com), who prompted "Zip Me: write a drabble about one character dressing another, or the other way around."
> 
> Also, bonus!soundtrack, found [here](http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLN020qFb9Ogt_JGe7Ry29ncVqvPCYXMyT). It'll help get you in the mood, I promise. Title of work stolen from the first song in the playlist.

If you ask him, Stiles will tell you that he made it to Derek’s place of his own volition, thank you very much, if by ‘own volition’ you mean that he put one foot in front of the other, even though he hadn’t put any weight on them and hadn’t even known where they were going. The only way he knows he’s at Derek’s is because of the dingy lighting and musky smell that always reminds Stiles of his basement.

“Why…” he asks, hoping Derek will understand. It’s just—his head is pounding and his body is aching and his ankle and shoulder are throbbing and he just wants a bed. Also maybe a glass of milk.

“Your dad’s home tonight,” Derek says, propping Stiles against a wall before he moves to pull the door open. The sound of metal scraping against metal makes Stiles wince as the pain spikes in his head. “You told him you’d be staying at Scott’s for the night, but since he’s currently recuperating on Deaton’s table, we had to bring you somewhere else.”

Stiles thinks he nods—he’s not sure when this decision was made, though the logic is sound—but then Derek is hauling Stiles’ good arm back over his shoulders and carrying him inside, so he’s not sure it really matters.

He’s set down with more care than he was expecting on something soft that gives a little under his weight. He reaches down to brace himself, ignoring the pain in his right shoulder, and realizes it’s a bed.

“Didn’ think you had a bed,” he mumbles, mostly because he didn’t think Derek slept. Like at all.

“What, did you think I slept swinging upside down by my ankles?”

Stiles glares the best he can at Derek’s back without lifting his head. “Tha’s vampires,” he says. “Don’ you know an’thin’?”

Derek snorts, and the look he’s wearing when he turns back around—oh hey, he changed his shirt, look at that—is somewhere between fond, amused, and exasperated. He’s holding something in his hands, and when he holds them out, Stiles realizes they’re clothes. Stiles makes an inquisitive noise, and Derek shrugs awkwardly.

“You’re kind of covered in siren guts and Scott’s blood. You need to change into these so you can sleep without waking up all…crusty.”

“Oh.” Now that Derek mentions it, he does kind of reek. He wonders how Derek’s wolf nose can stand it.

The reach for the clothes, however, strains his bad shoulder, and he can’t stop the hiss that escapes through his teeth. Derek pulls the clothes out of reach, looking extra frowny, and Stiles makes a pathetic noise that he refuses to call a whimper.

Then Derek takes another step closer. “You could barely walk here. I—” He shrugs. “I could help.”

And this confuses Stiles, because usually he’s the one offering to help, the one putting pants on naked-Jacksons-recently-changed-back-from-scaly-lizard-form. Having someone willing to do the same for him feels…strange. But he’s so tired, in that down-to-the-bones- _exhausted_  kind of way, that all he says is, “Okay.”

Derek nods, his face looking intense, like this is another thing he doesn’t want to screw up. He approaches Stiles warily, like he’s some kind of wild animal, although at this point, Stiles is no more dangerous than a newborn kit.

There’s a hand on his chest, warmth seeping in through the thin cotton of his t-shirt, and Stiles wonders if Derek can feel his heart beating in there. Then, with more care than Stiles was expecting, Derek begins to work Stiles’ overshirt off his uninjured arm. He doesn’t say anything as he works, eyes focused and mouth in a thin line, and once it’s off, he moves to the other arm, gently peeling the fabric down the length of Stiles’ arm. He tosses the shirt to the side and then takes in Stiles’ state.

“Jesus,” he breathes, fingers ghosting over the remnants of bruising on Stiles’ upper arms; most of it is a mottled green-ish yellow. “Is this all from today?” he asks, as his fingers trace down to the long still-pink scar on Stiles’ left forearm, from a harpy he’d saved Scott from over the summer. That one had been difficult to explain to his dad, but eventually he’d just sighed and told Stiles to stay out of trees for a while.

Stiles shakes his head, simultaneously shaking away the memory of his dad’s face. “Jus’ some.” Some of them are actually from lacrosse, surprisingly enough, so Stiles doesn’t feel too bad about telling his dad that’s where all of them come from.

Derek huffs a breath through his nose, mouth thinning even further, and then leans in, hands going for Stiles’ hips. Instinctively, Stiles twists away—not getting too far—and splutters out, “Wha…?”

“I’ve got to take off this one, too,” Derek says quietly, hands hovering around the bottom hem of Stiles’ shirt. “You’ve still got siren guts on you.”

Letting his chin drop to his chest, Stiles can see where the guts splattered where his overshirt had been left open. “Oh.”

Derek’s hands grasp the hem, and when Stiles doesn’t say anything, he takes it for the assent it is and begins to pull up the fabric. The cold air hitting his skin sends goosebumps skittering across his skin, nipples pebbling slightly, and he shivers, Derek only pausing in his movements long enough for them to settle.

He’s gone for Stiles uninjured arm first again, pushing and pulling the limb through the fabric. Stiles could probably make it easier on him, but he held Derek’s dead weight in a pool for two hours, so Derek can deal with Stiles not making any effort. As the bruises on Stiles’ torso become visible, Derek’s mouth grows even thinner, and Stiles is beginning to fear if it will actually disappear by the time they’re done.

Pulling the collar wide, he lifts the shirt over Stiles’ head, and then just lets it drop down Stiles’ injured arm. It pools around his wrist, which he doesn’t feel like moving yet, so he doesn’t. He doesn’t feel anything gelatinous or goopy or anything, so he figures he’s okay for now.

“We should put ice on this,” Derek says, hand skimming over Stiles’ swollen shoulder. Stiles doesn’t have to look to know it’s bruising, but he shakes his head.

“Deaton,” he replies, hoping Derek understands. Boyd had reset his shoulder before they’d even left the battlefield (and what a weird way of thinking, battlefields, Stiles isn’t even 18 yet, he shouldn’t have to think of battlefields) and once they’d met up at Deaton’s, the vet had given him a sling and an ice pack. Stiles had refused to wear the sling once they left, though, because he knows he read somewhere once that slings weren’t awesome.

Derek nods, once, thankfully comprehending more than Stiles is capable of communicating.

When Derek pulls back to grab the spare shirt, Stiles becomes suddenly aware of how intimate this is. He’s no stranger to being shirtless in front of guys, but he’s never really had the same affinity for shirtlessness the rest of his friends seem to have. And he knows his body isn’t half-bad. He never has and never will have the supercut physique that seems to come with being a werewolf, but he’s lean, without too much fat. Still…he’s pretty sure he hasn’t been this naked outside of the locker room in front of someone else since that time in freshman year when Mrs. McCall walked into Scott’s room without knocking after Stiles had just taken a shower.

He curls his uninjured arm around his stomach, while Derek shakes out a dark purple shirt with long sleeves from its neat folds. Then Derek is entirely in his space, close enough that Stiles can hear his breathing, almost feel his body heat. If Stiles looked up right now, he would be nose-to-nose with Derek, probably close enough to count his eyelashes or something equally as ridiculous.

He doesn’t look up.

Starting from the opposite direction this time, Derek fishes out Stiles’ hand from the folds of his siren-gutted t-shirt so he can pull it the rest of the way off. Then Stiles feels even more naked, because Derek is practically holding his hand right now, and it’s just…weird. Mostly because of how not-weird it actually feels.

The gross shirt gets dropped somewhere, and then Derek works the sleeve of the clean one up Stiles arm. Stiles doesn’t even try to cover up the small noises of discomfort he makes as Derek jostles his arm around, but he grows quiet once Derek has the shirt over his head. He threads Stiles’ other arm through the other sleeve, then pulls down the body of the shirt. Derek’s mouth seems to relax minutely once the bruises are all covered, but his eyes still linger over all the places Stiles aches, like he’s committing them to memory.

The shirt is softer than Stiles had been expecting, and it smells like laundry detergent (Stiles wants to giggle at the image of Derek doing laundry) and also a little like just Derek alone. It’s just a little too big, and Stiles curls his hands into weak fists around the hem of the sleeves.

Then he just…falls backward, ignoring the spike of pain down his shoulder upon impact. He raises his left arm up, draping it over his eyes, and he could probably fall asleep right here.

“C’n I go t’sleep yet?” he slurs, the loudness of his voice suddenly jarring after so long without any sound but their breathing and the rustling of fabric.

“Pants,” Derek reminds him quietly. “I can…leave them, if you like.”

Stiles sighs, because yeah, he could definitely use some different pants. “Nah, go for it,” he manages to get out, and then—oh, hello, then Derek’s hands are on the button of his jeans. Somehow he’d forgotten that would have to happen.

Swallowing loudly, Stiles knows that Derek can hear how his heartbeat just kicked up a few notches. Derek’s touch isn’t sexual at all—and Stiles actually probably couldn’t even get turned on if he tried right now—but still. This is the first time someone else will have taken off his pants. Ever.

Derek undoes the button and zip with almost clinical efficiency, before he’s back up at Stiles’ hips, tugging on the waistband. Without being prompted, Stiles lifts his hips, hissing at the pain of putting weight on both his injured ankle and shoulder. But Derek is quick, slipping the jeans past Stiles’ ass and to his knees, and Stiles flumps back down with a small groan.

“Sorry,” Derek says, almost too quiet for Stiles to hear, and then he’s kneeling in front of Stiles.

Stiles wants to drum up the proper amount of panic about this, but he finds himself just too tired to care. Derek doesn’t seem to care, easily working off Stiles shoes—careful around the injured ankle—so Stiles just lets himself sink into the bed. He doesn’t even care that he’s wearing boxer briefs with the Bat Signal across his dick.

“Socks?” Derek asks, and Stiles is surprised that he even asked.

“On,” he murmurs.

He can feel more than see Derek nodding at this vantage point, and then Derek pulls Stiles’ jeans the rest of the way off—again, ever-so careful around Stiles’ bad ankle—and tossing them wherever the rest of Stiles’ clothes ended up.

Then Stiles feels Derek’s warm hands coming around his ankle. He does it slowly, like he’s done almost everything, to give Stiles warning. Derek’s hands are still so warm, and as he massages gently at the distressed joint, the pain seems to just…melt away.

“Y’r doin’ that pain-sucky thing, arn’ you?” Stiles asks blurrily.

“Yes,” is all Derek gives him in response. As the pain dulls from sharp throbbing to a weak ache, Stiles groans happily.

“Y’r aw’sum,” he says with a sigh, eyes still closed under his arm.

Derek huffs out something like a laugh, slowly letting go of his ankle. Bracing himself with one hand on Stiles’ good knee, Derek reaches for the pants he’d pulled out earlier. Before Stiles knows it, he’s got the pants up to Stiles’ knees, and Stiles makes a petulant noise when he realizes he’s going to have to lift his hips again.

But then Derek is gone, rising to his feet, and Stiles moves his arm from his eyes to look up at him quiziccally, an inquisitive sound escaping from his throat. Derek doesn’t say anything, just gives Stiles a speculating look, and then all of a sudden Derek swoops in, one hand grabbing Stiles’ good arm, the other wrapping around his waist, and hauls him upright.

“Oh my god, what—”

Derek still doesn’t say anything, even as he manhandles Stiles into position. He slings Stiles’ arm around his own shoulders, the other easily holding Stiles up at the waist without having Stiles put any weight on his leg. “Hang on,” he says as he lets Stiles’ arm go—like Stiles wasn’t going to instinctively cling to him like this, what the fuck—and then both of Derek’s hands are at his waist.

Abruptly, Stiles is aware of how fucking close they are right now. Derek’s chest is firm against his, and Stiles can almost feel Derek’s pulse from where the vein in his neck is pressing against Stiles’ forehead, where he’d tucked his head into Derek’s neck rather than hook his chin over Derek’s shoulder. Derek also smells good, somehow, like Earth and sweat and skin, even a dash of some kind of masculine cologne in there. He’s also warm, so warm—

Derek then takes that moment to shift slightly, bending just enough that Stiles’ head tips down a little with his shoulder, as he holds Stiles up with one hand and reaches for the pants around his knees with the other. Somehow he manages to pull them up with only one sharp heaving motion that doesn’t hurt nearly as much as it should.

“You…” Stiles doesn’t even know where he was going with that, because Derek hasn’t directed him back to the bed yet. He’s still got one arm around Stiles’ waist, the other now up between Stiles’ shoulder blades, fingertips against the knob of Stiles’ spine, and his breathing is a steady rise and fall under Stiles’ cheek and into his ear.

“I…?” Derek prompts after a few moments of silence, sounding almost a little smug, and Stiles would roll his eyes if they were open.

“Warm,” he settles on, nosing a little into the collar of Derek’s shirt, because he  _is_. It feels like all the pain in his body is just seeping out through his pores now, only to be replaced by soft warmth. He knows it’s because Derek is doing that pain-sucky thing again, because now instead of feeling like he’d had it dislocated and then relocated a few hours ago, his shoulder just feels like he’s been practicing too many shots on goal.

The exhaustion settles in fully then. He doesn’t even know he’s dozed off until Derek shifts, lowering him until Stiles is sitting on the edge of the bed again. Once Derek lets go, Stiles sways a little, and he makes a noise that he really hopes Derek will forget later on, because he sounds like a kitten mewling if a kitten had human vocal cords. He sways a little too far back, then just lets himself flop down, smiling a little because Derek’s bed is soft as a fucking cloud right now. (Although he’s pretty sure he would feel the same way about the floor, to be completely honest.)

“Can you get into bed yourself, or do I have to tuck you in?” Derek asks, and Stiles can’t see it, but he knows his eyebrow is raised.

Slowly, Stiles shuffles back, only using his left arm and right leg, until his head hits a pillow and both legs are on the mattress. He gropes around blindly for the blanket, until Derek huffs and leads his hand to it. It doesn’t feel nearly warm enough, though, not compared to Derek, and as he lies there, he can feel all of the aching pressing in again.

He can hear Derek shuffling around—probably changing out of his own dirty jeans—and just when Stiles thinks Derek is going to be heading towards the bed, Stiles hears his footsteps heading for the door. He opens his eyes just in time to see Derek reach the doorframe.

“Hey.” His voice isn’t much more than a croak right now, but Derek hears him. Stiles watches his silhouette freeze, one hand on the doorframe, and then Derek looks back over his shoulder. “Stay.”

Derek looks like a deer caught in the headlights. “Stay?” he asks, like no one’s ever asked him that before.

“Stay,” Stiles repeats, because even though every particle of his being is screaming at him to just shut his eyes and go to sleep, let his body begin to repair itself, this is the one thing he thinks he wants even more.

Derek hesitates.

Stiles maintains eye contact, knowing that if he doesn’t, Derek will think he’s off the hook. He’s ready to repeat himself again, but then Derek nods, once. “You better not snore,” he warns, as he turns around and walks back toward the bed. Ah, yes. Humor. Perfect way to diffuse tension.

“Nah,” Stiles says, going along with it for now, as Derek pulls up the blanket and slides under it, careful not to jostle Stiles too much. “Sleep talk, though.”

Whatever Derek’s reply was going to be, it gets cut off when Stiles grabs his hand, pulling it around his body as he rolls onto his side. Derek tenses up, but Stiles relaxes into the heat of Derek’s body, perfectly okay with being completely selfish at the expense of someone else’s comfort, just this once.

But then Derek relaxes too, curling his arm more securely around Stiles’ waist, closing the distance between their bodies until there’s nothing but firm warmth pressing against Stiles’ back. It’s kind of like the best heating pad Stiles has ever encountered, and all of the aching is fading back down again. Stiles isn’t sure if it’s the heat or if it’s Derek doing his thing again.

“Hey, there’s somethin' Twilight got right,” Stiles says, and he can practically hear Derek’s eyebrow arch. “You guys’re fuckin’ furnaces, man.”

Derek lets out a puff of breath through his nose that’s totally a laugh while Stiles snickers quietly, and then Derek presses in minutely closer. “Go to sleep, Stiles.” Stiles hums and curls his arm under the pillow, bringing it closer.

For a few moments, it’s quiet. Stiles can hear their breathing, a little unsynchronized, and his own heart beating in his ears. He can feel himself start to drift off, but he needs to get one last thing out before he does.

“Thanks.”

Derek tenses slightly behind him, breathing in sharply, but when Stiles doesn’t add any of the things he wants to but is too tired for, Derek relaxes again. His nose brushes at the back of Stiles’ neck.

“You’re welcome.”


End file.
